Re: nvidia and 2.5.70 kernel

["Robert P. J. Day" <rpjday mindspring com>]

  i have X running in full 1600x1200 res on my inspiron 8100,
linux kernel 2.5.70-bk6, using nvidia geforce2go chip.  how it was 
done (regardless of whether or not it's the recommended technique):


1) install 2.5.70 kernel source, patch with bk6 if you want (the bk6
   part doesn't seem to be necessary but what the heck), make your
   basic bzImage/modules/modules_install and so on ... reboot to the
   new kernel and modules.  (if you're not familiar with building a
   new kernel, sorry, i'm not getting into that here.)

   ok, and now that you've rebooted under the new 2.5.70 kernel ...

2) in 2.5.70 kernel source tree: 
  
   # cd include/linux
   # ln -s ../config/modversions.h .

   don't ask why, the subsequent nvidia build wants to find that file

3)  download:

   www.nvidia.com: 	NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-4363.run
   www.minion.de:  	NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-4363-2.5.diff

4) to extract the NVIDIA driver source tree, run:

   # sh NVIDIA...run --extract-only

   this, as it implies, just unloads the driver source directory without
   actually trying to build the module

5) go into driver source directory, then further into usr/src/nv and
   do the following two things:

   a) apply that .diff patch *here*, in the nv directory
   b) ln -s Makefile.nvidia Makefile

   despite what you read, do *not* use the Makefile.kbuild file,
   it caused problems.

6) move back up to the top level of the driver source tree and

   # ./nvidia-installer

   it should complete, complaining about having built a tainted
   module, but you expect that.

7) finally, load the new nvidia module with:

   # modprobe nvidia

8) # startx

rday

--

Robert P. J. Day
Eno River Technologies
Unix, Linux and Open Source training
Waterloo, Ontario

www.enoriver.com